Great Customer Service Starts With a Can Do Attitude

In a recent presentation I made to our Wilmot Modular family, I discuss our core values, recognized some of our amazing employees, and highlighted our Can Do Attitude. I'd like to share this discussion with our blog readers to showcase the family commitment we have to solve for our customers and celebrate our achievements and the success of the people we work with.

Because of our Can Do Attitude — we were able to put a building on top of the capitol. We were able to drive a 70' long trailer on a winding road up a mountain in West Virginia using remote controls. We stopped ice shards from crashing through the roof of a building by building a steel canopy and we stopped all the naysayers and built the 2 story building at the port of Baltimore in 70 days. That Can Do spirit has grown this company — and with it, our co-workers.

Both Ted and Butch proved what happens when you consistently want to learn more and improve. Both worked as truck drivers, and both kept improving their management skills. Ted now heads up Operations and Butch heads up Fleet Management. Anthony started as a painter but then took the initiative to learn carpentry and electrical skills — now he's a valuable member of the Work Order Team. Toni has become our "Smart Draw" Queen and has learned not only all the tasks that you need to know at the front desk but also those of a lease coordinator; Kathy has learned how to do modular building reviews - she has learned how to find red flags in building specs. Mike Wayland takes courses all the time to learn new accounting rules and refresh his knowledge so he can guide the company down the right financial path.

By them and others improving themselves, our company's ability to accomplish what we have to do has improved. All of that makes our customers happy and keeps them coming back.

Not to mention our great customer service. How many companies would have done what our team did to help out Wicomico County when one of their classrooms burned down over Martin Luther King Jr's birthday weekend several years ago? Talk about team work and providing great customer service!

Lori received a call from a representative of Wicomico County on Friday evening. A classroom had burned down and they needed to have a place to put the kids on Tuesday morning when the school went back in session after the holiday. Lori called Butch. Butch called his crew and alerted our Dispatcher. The guys came in over the holiday weekend and got the units prepped. We had two big challenges though ¬you can't pull units over the Bay Bridge on a Sunday and on top of that, there were wind warnings in effect — so nothing is to go over the bridge! But our team didn’t give up and was smart enough to use the ace they had up their sleeves. Our Dispatchers' wife happened to work for the Md Transit Authority. He got her to pull some strings that allowed us to haul the units on a Sunday and get over the bridge... If we could get there by a certain time. Butch and Ted drove the units themselves and rushed to get them to the bridge. They knew if they could get to the toll booth before the cut-off time, they would make it! As they got there, instead of stopping them, the toll police waved them through so they made the deadline. We were there for that customer.

When we are there for our customers — we are telling them WE are reliable. YOU are reliable. That is a characteristic that not only makes a company successful — it makes a person successful. A reliable person is someone who you can trust to behave well, work hard, or do what is expected of them whether they are being watched or not. It's Kathy Cadigan working late to make sure all the details are correct on an order or Ron, Frankie and Anthony working until 10:00 at night to make sure a unit goes out on time. It's Mike Wayland taking work home just so he can get ahead of the mounting workload he faced with financing, going through audits, appraisals and still doing his regular job. And when we are reliable... it leads us into doing The Right Thing.

Of all our core values — THIS is the one that I believe describes us and this company the most. we always strive to do the right thing. It may cost us money — which it many times does. It can make us late on deliveries, which, unfortunately, sometimes happens. But at the end of the day — we can boldly say "We did it the right way."

Recently, when a customer told Ryan to go ahead and build the building in the factory before they obtained permits. Ryan protected us and said that's not how it should be done and it's certainly not how we do it here. The customer canceled the order. But only to call back a few days later saying we were right and gave us back the order. They are even paying for extra work they want to be done. We took the high road and kept our standards up.

When Butch asks guys to work overtime so we can paint or re-tile a unit — not necessarily because the customer asked for that, but because they want the unit to be up to our standards — and it's the Right Thing to do.

All of those things I've mentioned are important. But they are not things you learn in a classroom or even trained to do — they are part of what makes up each of you. It's in your core — it's your core values. Whether it's in your upbringing or in your genes — I don't know. But one thing I do know, people with those values are who we want on our team.

Identifying those values is important, because it lays the groundwork for who we are, where we are going, how we are going to get there, and when. We are on a path that will take each of us to places we have never been before, and do things we have never achieved before. We are on a path that will take us wherever we want to go.

This is an exciting time at Wilmot Modular Structures.

Mike and I are glad that you are on the ride WITH us. This is our promise to you - We are both dedicated and driven to making Wilmot Modular Structures a GREAT company to work for and to work with.

What we ask of you is to pull together as a team — commit to always doing your best and being true to yourself and your co-workers. We'll go places you've never dreamed!